Dear Friends,

Time is both wonderful and horrible. it is wonderful because it holds so much fantastic possibility. It is my work and my life. I create beautiful objects that measure time. If time didn't exist, then my profession wouldn't exist. I wouldn't have 42 watch plants. I wouldn't have built a company with $3 billion in sales. I wouldn't be a billionaire. And I wouldn't have given pleasure to the many people who have bought my watches.

Yet I hate time. Why? Because you cannot keep it. You cannot catch it. You cannot stop it. You cannot possess it. It's always present, but if you try to hold it, it disappears.

We all feel so very important. I certainly do. I walk around the streets of Switzerland, and people recognize me and whisper to their friends that I am the chief executive of one of the biggest companies in the world. I saved the Swiss-watch industry. I partner with giant corporations. I'm doing important things. What does time do? It turns me to dust. I am a tiny particle on a tiny planet in a vast universe. In the end, I am even less than that.

So never try to manage time. It will beat you at every turn. Never try to plan your days and nights minute by minute. Do schedule your time, but never schedule 100% of it. You'll kill your creative impulse if you do. Never try to organize every minute of your time weeks in advance, or you'll be bored to death. Instead, let time renew itself around you. Let it divert you. Let it do something unexpected, something new. Let it bring nice things, and let it bring bad things over which you have no control. And don't try to use personal tricks to fool time. It will always catch up with you.

Nicolas G. Hayek, a celebrity in Switzerland, turned the insolvent Swiss-watch industry into a multibillion-dollar empire. The Swatch Group includes such brands as Omega, Rado, Tissot, and Swatch.

Joe Brown